Ask HN: Router recommendation to replace Ubiquiti?
I've combed the recent threads and there has been some comment threads where recommendations are made, but thought I'd cast a wider net as I'm sure there are many of us asking the same question.
Otherwise, you're looking at Microtik/pfsense/opnsense.
My usual need for fancy routers is dealing with crap connections and/or abusive users and SQM CAKE is just incredible for that.
Since OpenWrt is Linux it usually has better Wifi support too. You can run it on really affordable routers that double as wireless AP unless you need to traffic shape 200+mbps
The sub model matters. Some manufacturers like TP-link change the hardware without updating model name. You can see the version number of hardware on the serial.
There's a crapton of routers supported. There's a supported device list and a bunch of Reddit/forum threads on the OpenWrt forums about best devices. The best device is the cheapest one you can get on eBay or clearance that works well with OpenWrt and can handle your network speed with SQM. Beware of devices with working OpenWrt but broken Wifi or broken 5ghz. This is by far the most common broken driver in otherwise working OpenWrt devices.
In general, MIPS and other weird architectures are the slowest, old ARM like v6 are faster, newer ARM pretty fast, and X86 is fastest. See list of SoC's https://openwrt.org/docs/techref/hardware/soc
Dual+ core variants of these architectures will handle more speed too. I would estimate single core MIPS is good for 15 megabits SQM, single core "old" ARM maybe 30. Newer ARM chips like Cortex 8, maybe 70 single core. For more cores just multiply those numbers.
Above ~300 megabits an x86 PC made with used parts will be cheapest. I have heard higher end Raspberry Pi are quite fast routers as well. For these options you will need a "dumb" AP for WiFi and just plug all the traffic through the wired shaping router with dual NIC's right between the modem and rest of your network. One NIC for LAN other for WAN side.
TLDR: If you don't want to fuck with anything, have $250, and don't have more than 200 megabits connection, get an R7800.
Other options can have things like crazy flashing process or broken stuff or unofficial builds or split AP/router or just take more research to find.
R7800 is wildly popular, well supported, fast-ish, has a lot of flash and ram, and somewhat easy to flash (you still to setup tftp on a Linux box to do it).
See my other comment about enabling per-ip fairness, it's an "advanced" option for piece of CAKE SQM script but it's easy to setup
And SQM CAKE with IP based flows enabled is the best load balancing you will find anywhere. I've used it to make 5mbit DSL links usable for a whole office. It's magic.
The automation side is lacking, but it has SSH so you can get anything done with bash scripts and elbow grease.
Only time I might not use it is a huge installation where full automation isn't optional.
It depends on protocol assigned DSCP values to prioritize traffic from a single host. You can easily assign these in Linux and Windows if your app doesn't already add them, most real time stuff does.
Between hosts it does fairness based scheduling. So if two IP's are trying to use whole connection, each will get half, and any high priority services on each machine will get most of that half.
I think you will find that with IP based fairness, traditional traffic priorities don't really matter. If the connection is slow, users intuitively know to stop doing background stuff on their own machine. I've done multiple video streams + zoom calls on a 1up 6down DSL connection and these protocols all play nicely with fair bandwidth distribution since SQM CAKE keeps packet delay low.
Works extremely well, but it's CPU intensive for fast connections.
Your best bet for such speeds is running on X86. OpenWrt runs fine on regular desktop PC if you use hardware with good Linux support. Especially be cautious of the wifi drivers/device. Or, you can traffic shape with the PC using two gigabit NIC's and leave the wireless to a "dumb AP" regular router.
So yeah for one gig shaping I think the best option is a regular X86 machine with good NIC's (Intel maybe). You can get fanless ones sold for home theatre. Or, what I recommend, use a regular PC in a cheapo case with Noctua A Series fans. Even at max speed Noctua A fans are barely audible. And you can turn them down in BIOS if you get a decent mobo
You can try it with an old machine first but make sure it at least has PCI Express. Old school PCI slots only have 1gig of bandwidth so having two (one lan, one wan) will max out the bus. My first gen core i5 750 was able to shape at 400 megabits with the bus maxed out :)
I'll add to this, to get holy grail per-ip balancing with SQM CAKE you need to enable an advanced option. See https://openwrt.org/docs/guide-user/network/traffic-shaping/... section "To enable Per-Host Isolation"
Opnsense might also be an interesting alternative.
It just works. Perfectly. Spend your fiddling time on something else, there’s no need to goof with home networking in 2021.